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People in the News at MPI for Evolutionary Anthropology, Roche, TwinStrand, Quantum-Si, More

MPI for Evolutionary Anthropology: Svante Pääbo

Svante Pääbo has won the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work on genomes of extinct hominins and human evolution. He is a director at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, which he founded in 1999. Before that, he was a professor at the University of Munich. Pääbo's team published the first Neanderthal genome sequence in 2010, work that was followed by the genome sequences of the Denisovan and other ancient humans.


Roche: Matt Sause

Matt Sause, currently president and CEO of Roche Diagnostics' North America Region, will become CEO of Roche Diagnostics, effective Jan. 1, 2023. He will take over from Thomas Schinecker, who will become Roche's CEO on March 15. Sause previously served as lifecycle leader for Tecentriq Lung and Head and Neck Cancers at Roche subsidiary Genentech and has held a variety of commercial general management and global product leadership roles at Roche since he joined the company in 2002.


Quantum-Si: Jeff Hawkins

Quantum-Si has appointed Jeff Hawkins as CEO. He is succeeding Jonathan Rothberg, the company's founder and executive chairman, who had been serving as interim CEO. Prior to joining Quantum-Si, Hawkins was president and CEO of Truvian Sciences. Before that, he led Illumina's reproductive and genetic health business unit. He has also held roles at GenMark, Hologic, Third Wave Technologies, and Abbott Laboratories.


TwinStrand Biosciences: Chad Brown, Jesse Salk

TwinStrand Biosciences has named Chad Brown as interim CEO as part of a company reorganization. He succeeds Jesse Salk, the company's founder, who will continue to serve as CSO. Brown is a member of the firm's board and was senior VP of sales and marketing at NanoString Technologies from 2017 to April 2022. He has also held leadership positions at Qiagen, Roche Diagnostics, and Chiron Diagnostics.


For additional recent items on executive appointments, promotions, and departures in the omics and molecular diagnostics space, please see the People in the News page on our website.

The Scan

Positive Framing of Genetic Studies Can Spark Mistrust Among Underrepresented Groups

Researchers in Human Genetics and Genomics Advances report that how researchers describe genomic studies may alienate potential participants.

Small Study of Gene Editing to Treat Sickle Cell Disease

In a Novartis-sponsored study in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers found that a CRISPR-Cas9-based treatment targeting promoters of genes encoding fetal hemoglobin could reduce disease symptoms.

Gut Microbiome Changes Appear in Infants Before They Develop Eczema, Study Finds

Researchers report in mSystems that infants experienced an enrichment in Clostridium sensu stricto 1 and Finegoldia and a depletion of Bacteroides before developing eczema.

Acute Myeloid Leukemia Treatment Specificity Enhanced With Stem Cell Editing

A study in Nature suggests epitope editing in donor stem cells prior to bone marrow transplants can stave off toxicity when targeting acute myeloid leukemia with immunotherapy.